Before my first child, Max, was born (three weeks early via unexpected C-section), my sister-in-law showed up at the hospital with take-out from my favorite Chinese restaurant. Crispy spring rolls! General Tso’s tofu! Stir-fried noodles! What a perfect meal to indulge in before welcoming a baby into the world. Unfortunately, I had forgotten about the no-eating-before-surgery rule. My last meal turned out to be ice chips.
Curious, I reached out to six fellow food writers to ask about their last meals before giving birth. From a feast of Georgian dumplings to a dinner at the same Italian restaurant where the couple ate before conceiving their baby, the answers did not disappoint…
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“My plan was to meet friends at a hole-in-the-wall Georgian restaurant at the far end of Brooklyn. It was five degrees out, the subway got screwed up, and I wound up walking alone in a neighborhood I was not exactly familiar with. But when I arrived, it was like a big party. We talked and toasted, and I ate my weight in khinkali dumplings, lamb soup, borscht, sausages with plum sauce, and lots of pickles. When I finally went to bed, I woke up three hours afterward and thought, ‘Is this indigestion or am I in labor?’ I think you know the answer.” — Sarah Karnasiewicz, features editor at The Wall Street Journal and writer of Magpie
“In early July, I was 39 weeks pregnant, so we were taking all the walks to bring on labor. We passed an ice cream shop, and I was struck with this deep, almost violent craving for chocolate ice cream. I ordered a cone and my husband said, ‘We will share it.’ And I said, ‘Absolutely not, get your own.’ Six hours later, when we were heading to bed, I leaned forward to give my husband a kiss good night and my water broke!” — Rachel Tepper Paley, Digital Editorial Director at Wine Enthusiast Magazine
“I was fiercely willing my daughter to join us before I’d need to be induced, and one piece of advice I got for speeding things up was: ‘Babies like to come when it’s inconvenient, so make it inconvenient.’ After contractions woke me up at 6 a.m., they stayed weak and fleeting all day, so my husband and I made things inconvenient by going to the legendary Park Slope restaurant Al Di La. When I sat down with a bowl of pasta bolognese, my contractions suddenly became more insistent. By the time it took for my husband’s profiteroles to drop, we knew we had to grab our go bag and rush to the hospital. Later that week, we went back to pick up the credit card we’d left in the blur.” — Kristen Migliore, author of the Genius Recipes cookbook series and co-author of the forthcoming The Montessori Kitchen
“My due date was the following week, and my dad had already come to town. We all went out to a local BBQ spot. My sweet tooth was insane, so for dessert, I ordered a mini buffet of everything they had — I remember the pecan pie was so good. I told my sister that I was having Braxton Hicks at the table, but now I know they were real contractions because my water broke the next morning. Looking back at the family photo from that night, I can see it was so obvious that I was gonna pop!” — Jerrelle Guy, author of Black Girl Baking and the forthcoming We Fancy
“A few days after my due date, I strolled to a nearby bakery solo for the perfect chocolate croissant. On my way back, I had my first contraction. Forty-four hours later, our baby girl was born. Her birth was a marathon, and that single chocolate croissant kept me going for nearly two days. Fifteen years later, it’s still one of my favorite foods, and now hers.” — Sarah Copeland, author of The Newlywed Cookbook and Every Day is Saturday, and writer of Edible Living
“My evening induction got canceled because there were no available beds. So, my partner and I decided to go out for one last meal before the baby arrived. We went to Frankies Spuntino in Brooklyn, and I ate their decadent eggplant parm. Frankies is also where we ate the night our son was conceived. It was one of the first dinners out we’d had since the beginning of the pandemic; I drank an ice-cold olive oil martini and was giddy with the freedom of eating in a restaurant. Needless to say, I did not have a martini with dinner nine months later, but I did leave happy and ready for the promise of a new life in the morning.” — Sari Kamin, author of the forthcoming Honey & Schmaltz
Leah Koenig is the freelance writer and the award-winning author of seven Jewish cookbooks. She also writes the newsletter The Jewish Table. She lives in Brooklyn with her family.
P.S. Five gifts for new moms, and what was your first meal after giving birth?
(Photo by Amor Burakova/Stocksy.)
